Mixtape Review | Joey Purp – iiiDrops

This mixtape was released on May 29th this year. I think. It might’ve been May 27th. I don’t know when the exact date was. Late May. Anyway, Joey Purp is a member of SAVEMONEY, which you may be familiar with due to the successes of ChanceTheRapper & Vic Mensa. The only reason I ever gave this guy a chance was because he’s a member of SAVEMONEY. The first song I ever heard from him was a single from this mixtape called Cornerstore, which I obviously liked. The reception of this mixtape has been very positive, and what I heard was great, so I’m expecting this project to be very good.

Track 1: Morning Sex (Prod. Odd Couple)

Oh shitfuck. This beat is dope af. The hook is cool. It lasts way too long tho. He’s goin’ in on the first verse now. This is great. It’s pretty much what you’d expect from a Chicagoan MC lyrically. He’s talking a lot about homicide and other forms of crime. “I’m trying to die alive / And if he says his heart kind, know that man a lie / Still feel all his ill feelings in his diatribes / You see the world in my daughter’s eyes / If you had to see what she has seen you’d be traumatized.” I’m really enjoying this. Oh, there’s just one long verse on this song. I guess that makes the long hook easier to swallow. Literally. Just kidding. I love the background vocals that come in during the second recital of the hook. This is a really good song. I don’t really have any problems with it. I love the grandiose production. This was a great way to start the mixtape, and a great introduction to Joey Purp. I definitely fuck with this. This is dope af. 5/5

Goddamn. This beat is fucking crazy. This sounds like some Clipse era Neptunes shit. Uh oh… I don’t know about this trendy subject matter… The first verse was alright I guess. Joey’s flow and delivery were REALLY fucking annoying tho. Chance’s verse was dope af. He killed that shit. His flow was perfect for this beat. Joey’s second verse was better than his first, but I’m still not really in love with it. It started off kinda slow ’cause he was usin’ the same flow and delivery from his first verse, but he eventually switched it up. I don’t know about this one. I loved the production, and Chance’s flow was fantastic, but other than that I’m not really feelin’ it. I don’t really like club music that much, so I probably won’t ever listen to this again. I think it’s alright tho. I don’t think it’s bad. It’s just not for me. My sister would probably like it. I can’t do this one tho… 3/5

God fucking damn… The production on this mixtape has been insane so far. This beat is dope af. The hook isn’t bad. The first verse from Joey was dope. Mick’s goin’ in now. He killed it. The hook gets old pretty quickly, but I enjoyed both of the verses from Joey & Mick, and the beat is fantastic. I don’t have anything else to say about this track. It’s just two dope verses over a great beat. Mick kinda stole the show, but Joey’s verse was very good too. I fuck with this song. It’s dope. 4/5

Track 4: When I’m Gone Feat. Teddy Jackson (Prod. The Gift)

This beat is dope af. This song is pretty much one long ass verse with an interruption from Teddy Jackson after every 6 bars. It’s great tho. This is definitely one of the better songs so far in my opinion. I feel like the hooks on most of the songs on this tape have been way too long up to this point, so it’s nice that this one is just a single line from Teddy Jackson. As for the actual rapping, Joey did a great job. This is probably the best song so far in terms of the lyrics. Everything he had to say on this track was much more interesting than on the other tracks. I actually cared about what he was saying on this track. Not that I didn’t care what he was saying on the other ones. This one is just far more engaging in my opinion. Well, I guess I DIDN’T care what he was saying on the second track, but that’s the only exception. This song is great tho. I don’t really have any problems with it. This is dope af to me. 5/5

Track 5: Photobooth (Prod. GARREN & Knox Fortune)

Good fucking lord. This production is on another level. This production is a lot better than that of most albums I’ve heard this year. I love this beat. I could definitely see how it could get annoying for some people tho. If it had a much lower pitch I could see Vince Staples rapping over this. It kinda gives off the same vibe as Norf Norf. It’s dope af. The first verse just ended. It was pretty good. Joey Purp isn’t much of a lyricist, but I still enjoy him rapping. He has a pretty good flow, and he has a lot of energy behind the mic. The hook’s alright. Yeah, the beat definitely gets kind of annoying after a while, but I still enjoyed it for the most part. This is dope. Again, the shit Joey was actually saying wasn’t super impressive, but I enjoyed the song sonically. This is dope. 4/5

As I kinda mentioned before, this is the song that made me wanna check this mixtape out. I think the only reason I listened to it in the first place was because Saba & theMIND were featured on it. I loved Saba’s work on Coloring Book, and I don’t think I’ve ever heard a bad feature from theMIND either. Again, the production is fucking awesome. This is probably my favorite beat on the whole tape so far. It’s definitely the most interesting track lyrically too. Y’all know I love sad music, so I fucking love this song. He’s rapping about growing up in Chicago. The instrumental is super emotional sounding, but not in a soft, Drake way. I don’t think any of the hooks have been particularly bad on this mixtape, but none of them have really stood out that much. This one is great tho. “Talking to my brother every week from off that prison phone / May never come home.” The first verse from Joey Purp is fucking incredible. I love the way he’s yelling every word. It just sounds super emotional. “Chiraq look like the Middle East / And white kids deal with problems that we never knew to bother / Arguing with they dads; we pray we ever knew our fathers / Release day 2050; he’ll never meet his daughter.“

FUCK. I just started the fucking song over by accident. Whatever. I’ll just listen to it again. Yeah, Joey’s delivery on this first verse is fantastic. It sounds like he’s sheddin’ a tear as he’s rapping. You can hear his voice kinda cracking. This is awesome. Okay, I’ve finally caught up to where I was when I accidentally restarted the song. The bridge from theMIND was great. Saba’s goin’ in now. “My grandma asked if I had everything for school / It seem like she growing more overprotective as I get older / She lost both of her sons, and I can feel it when she kiss me / She don’t sleep ’til I get home, and she don’t like me in the city.” He fuckin’ killed this shit. This verse is incredible. God. This song is fucking amazing. “My best friend from when I was 11 posted with the weapon / Acting like he do not see me stepping to their section / We used to hoop daily and treat it like a profession / And now I’m walking by him like I’m some type of pedestrian.” This song is absolutely dope af. I have no problems with this track. Now I need to hear a solo project from Saba because he killed that shit. I fuck with this song. This is dope af. 5/5

Track 7: Say You Do (Prod. Knox Fortune & Peter Cottontale)

This beat’s not bad. Ummm… I don’t know about this song… This shit he’s rapping about… It’s kinda weird that he goes from such a heavy track like Cornerstore to this trendy song about some girl. This kinda reminds me of Girls @. It’s like that song, except this time he’s speaking to a specific girl instead of girls in general. I’m really not feelin’ his flow on this either. This is… bad… The only thing that I like about this song is the production, and this isn’t even that good of a beat. It’s definitely the most underwhelming beat on the tape so far. Nah. I’m not feelin’ this song. His flow is annoying. This song is pissing me the fuck off. I can’t believe he followed Cornerstore up with this track. This shit is wack to me. I can’t fuck with this one. 2/5

This beat is pretty good. “That’s uncool like your mother’s brother.” Wooow. I really don’t know about that line. He really stretched that simile right at the beginning of the track. I’ll allow it tho. HAHAHA. Yo, this line is hilarious. “Double cut sippin’ paint dropping off the Caddy frame / Two tone whip change colors, I call it Charlemagne.” Okay, I was kinda hesitant toward this song with that “uncool/uncle” line, but he won me back with the Charlemagne line. That was dope af. I fuck with this song. There’s not really a hook… It’s more of an interlude. It sounds like it’s a sample from a movie or something. I don’t know for sure tho. The song has a very simple structure, and it ends kind of abruptly, but I still enjoyed it. This is dope to me. 4/5

Track 9: Kids (Prod. Knox Fortune & Franco Davis)

I just listened to the first minute of this song, and I really don’t know what to think yet… The beat’s pretty cool, and the subject matter sounds like it could be kinda interesting, but… Joey’s singing the hook in autotune, and I can’t decide whether or not I like it. I don’t think it’s that bad. Actually, I think I do like it. I gotta listen to it a few more times… I don’t know yet. Joey’s goin’ in on the first verse now. Oh. I guess he’s gonna be singing with autotune for the whole song. Nah… The hook just came back on. I don’t like it. It sounded alright at first, but it just gets annoying really quickly. Seriously, his singing is really high pitched. It’s annoying as FUCK. This sounds like a bad Travi$ Scott impersonation. This isn’t even a well written song. This is bad. I can’t fuck with this shit. This is wack to me. 2/5

Oh shit… This beat is fuckin’ crazy. It has that same grandiose sound that Morning Sex & Cornerstore have. This first verse from Joey is great. “You killin’ niggas in your hood, you the KKK? / What’s the difference between you and them? / Boys in blue and the boys in white / I used to be with them / Boys in blue sellin’ poison white to my own folks.” As you can see, he’s rappin’ about black on black crime and the shit people do to each other in the hood. This is when Joey’s at his best in my opinion. This is almost as good as Cornerstore. The first verse was fantastic. I don’t think Vic Mensa is that great of a singer, but the hook wasn’t too bad. Vic’s verse wasn’t as good as Joey’s, but I still enjoyed it. I really fuck with this song. I think it would’ve been better if it was just a solo Joey Purp track, but it’s still dope to me. 4/5

Track 11: Escape (Prod. The Gift, Peter Cottontale & Carter Lang)

This is another song with that grandiose production that I mentioned during the previous track. The beat is dope af. The first verse was pretty good. This hook from Knox Fortune & Teddy Jackson is actually really dope. The last verse was dope too. I don’t really have anything else to say. I really like the song tho. It has a really simple structure, and nothing about it is super unique, but everything is just really well executed. The production and hook are dope af, and I enjoyed the verses too. This is dope af to me. 5/5

Final Thoughts:

This mixtape is very, very good. The production throughout this project was dope af. Even the beats that weren’t super attention grabbing were still above average. In terms of just the production, this is one of the best projects I’ve heard all year. This guy working at Starbucks is fucking annoying as shit. He thinks he’s some kind of comedian or something. He just made a joke about some girl getting murdered in Chicago. What a fucking dick. Now he’s talking about the murder rate in Durham. I don’t know why everybody always acts like Durham is Detroit or Chiraq or something. It’s not like you get murdered wherever you go here. I think I live in a white neighborhood tho, so I can’t really speak on that. Anyway, this is one of the best mixtapes I’ve heard all year. It’s nice to finally hear some dope shit from a new artist. We haven’t really had any new MCs breakout this year. Joey Purp isn’t the greatest lyricist, but I definitely think he’s above average. I’d much rather listen to him than Vic Mensa. Not that Vic Mensa is super wack; I just don’t really fuck with his music that much. He has his moments tho. So yeah. I really enjoyed this project. It’s very dope. I swear to God if this guy working at Starbucks doesn’t shut the fuck up I will lose my fucking mind.

UPDATE: Okay, I just purchased something from Starbucks, and that guy was actually really nice. I feel bad for getting mad at him now…

Published by OG Nick Marsh

I am not a music expert. My reviews are completely subjective and should not sway anyone’s opinion on any musical project. I don’t grade albums based on how “good” they are objectively. The score they receive depends on how much I enjoy them personally.
View all posts by OG Nick Marsh